Category Archives: animation

We are already familiar with the talents of Todd Watts, a graphic designer and animator based in Melbourne, Australia. You may remember the series of manipulated books depicting his favorite stories, transformed imaginative works of art. As we fast forward to this year, he had been honing his paper design skills with the team at SNASK, where they were approached by music licensing company - Epidemic Sound to collaborate in creating a stop-motion, paper crafted animation. We all know music can make or break an animation, so they lead with a resounding HELL YEAH!

Hayley Morris of Shape & Shadow has created a mesmerizing music video for Austin based band Explosions in the Sky using her trademark stop-motion animation style incorporated with thousands of paper shapes and geometric sculptures. To create these hypnotizing patterns and folds along side the single ‘The Ecstatics,’ Morris uses delicate cut-outs made of paper, moving each unique piece by hand. The latticed shapes and origami sculptures are then brought to life through projection mapping and marine colors.

We have been incredibly enamored by the body of astounding visual works through talented husband and wife duo Davy and Kristin McGuire. They have the ability to convey imaginative stories, sometimes even extremely romantic, through projection mapping animations onto large paper dioramas. The viewer is able to peer into these worlds with wonder, feeling wrapped up in these given moments as if they might be there themselves.

Inspired by the papercraft aesthetics and projection techniques that they developed for their first commission from Courvoisier, Alchimie de Courvoisier, the cognac brand invited them to create paper film sets for their new campaign. The commercial above has been shown in cinemas, and the paper rendering of the Eiffel Tower and the Parisian town house for the key visual are now on display in Courvoisier‘s own museum in Jarnac, France.

Animated paper cutouts come together to form a visual representation of a poem influenced by the Greek mythological character Orpheus. In Transmission, illustrator and animator Afroditi Bitzouni interprets Chris Sakellaridis’s poem of the same name through a form of cut out collage animation. This experimental performance combines poetry, music, animation, dance and opera. There is a seamless fluidity through Bitzouni’s animation of fragmented landscapes and abstract humanoids from scraps of colored paper. The majority of the cut outs are grain layer construction paper while others look like they were taken from a magazine or book.

If you are a video game enthusiast like myself, you're familiar with the popular video game, now turned movie Assassin's Creed, now out in theaters. Well Singapore-based designer Serene Teh has taken her hand-drawn black and white illustrations and transformed them into an action packed frame-by-frame animation, featuring the stunts, building leaping, and parkour movements seen throughout the film. The stop motion animation was created through the flipping of paper, while recording the with a handheld camera. The animation was later sped up in Adobe Premiere to provide more fluidity and syncing with the song. Amazing job!

The year has finally come to a close and the new year is upon us... Goodbye 2016, not gonna miss ya! I will however say that I look forward to all of the new art projects and paper artists that will pour into 2017. So let's take a look back to the 20 most popular posts from 2016, which span categories such as handcrafted paper sculptures, colorful installations, intricate origami, whimsical set designs, animations with projection mapping and so much more! Happy New Year from Strictlypaper!

With the use of watercolor paper, PVA glue and a lot of patience, Edinburgh artist Charles Young has built this meticulously handcrafted metropolis he calls 'Paperholm'. Over the past two years, Young has dedicated what I can only imagine to be countless hours to creating more than 600 handmade miniaturearchitectural structures, including urban monuments, vehicles, residences and rollercoasters, each forming an integral part of the final cityscape.

The dynamic duo behind Ové Pictures, Slovak directors and illustrators Veronika Obertová and Michaela Čopíková, have created a traveling interactive exhibition 'Searching for Beauty'. They understand that “new beauty” is a shift of aesthetic perception in the world around us, moving away from the idealized concepts that have been instilled in us in the past, and instead looking to understand beauty in real environments where we exist in our everyday lives.

This paper zoetrope, made using over 350 paper models, symbolizes the "Beauty of Life" and incorporates the four elements - water, air, earth and fire, but their nod, per se, is the animation through the start of the egg at the very top and the fight of the chicken at the very end as a representation of full cycle of life.

In lieu of Strictlypaper's 6th birthday this year, we have chosen 60 astounding examples of the most loved paper art works from over the years. Since the beginning, that hot summer day long, long ago in 2010, the major focus of SP has always been to highlight the most creative use of paper, this spanning across a very wide array of fields and categories, with artist from all over the world. We have always strived to be a source of inspiration to push your work just one step further, as well as a hub for other paper artists and artists alike to learn about one another... because we all know there are SOOOOO many artists out there! With that said, please enjoy this selection of paper sculptures, origami, animations, paper fashion, installations, collages and more. Share to the masses, because in the end, we couldn't have done it without you. So THANK YOU and here's to the future!!!!

It's been a while since we have posted about the beautifully mesmerizing projection mapped works of Davy and Kristen McGuire. You may remember the piece entitled ‘Alchimie de Courvoisier’, which represented the heart of Courvoisier by reimagining the prestigious Paradis cellar encased in glass, showing the viewer the process of the how Courvoisier is made.

In this installment,‘Precious Moments’ takes place in a large paper crafted diorama measuring 3 meters wide, revealing a busy Parisian street as a corner window display. The overall theme surrounds the journey of two couples falling in love and their stories are brought to life with projection mapping.